Out Of Time
by Bottle Red Rosie
Summary: Cal must return an oddly familiar child home, otherwise he might lose his brother for good. Gen, complete, mild language, warnings for kiddies in peril. Cal POV


Rating: G  
Words: 12,000  
Warnings: Mild language, kiddies in peril.  
Summary: Cal must return an oddly familiar child home, otherwise he might lose his brother for good. One shot. Complete. Cal POV. Spoilers up to around Slash Back.  
Disclaimer: All is owned by someone else.  
A/N: Finally the Cal and Niko fic that I started about two years ago has an ending! You might need to draw yourself a diagram by the end of it. Liberties taken with the Leandros brothers' ages and dates of birth and the general real world timeline of the books.

**OUT OF TIME**

"Huh," I said, squinting at my phone.

Niko looked up from the kitchen table, where he was sitting polishing his katana to such a high shine it was a wonder it wasn't visible from space.

"Problem?" he asked.

And honestly? I wasn't entirely sure.

uH

"Text message," I replied, re-reading the message for the fourth time and still not certain I understood it.

Niko continued to stare at me evenly. "And…?" he prodded.

"It's…" I began, before stopping and reading the message again. "Cryptic," I decided.

"And from whom did you receive this cryptic text message that has you so perplexed?" Nik asked.

Sometimes I wasn't sure if he spoke like he had a stick up his ass just to annoy me.

"I don't know," I replied. "That's why I'm so 'perplexed,' genius."

Nik stopped polishing his katana, and if that wasn't a euphemism for something, I don't know what was, and stood, moving over to my position slouched over the kitchen counter. He looked at my phone over my shoulder.

He was a couple of inches taller than me, so even if I'd been standing up straight he would still have been able to violate my privacy without any problem whatsoever.

"_You need to be at Strawberry Fields at 6.30pm_,_" _he read.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"_There's someone you need to meet,__"_ he continued. _"__You'll know him when you see him_._"_ He pursed his lips and scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Huh."

"Yeah," I agreed.

"This is probably a trap," he observed.

"Yes," I agreed. "It probably is."

"But we're going to walk right into it, aren't we?"

"Yes. We probably are."

* * *

Strawberry Fields was a little corner of Central Park just over the street from the Dakota Building, where John Lennon was shot dead in 1980. At this time of the evening, most of the tourists had gone, although a few still lingered. There wasn't a lot to see. A little garden. A sign. A plaque. Your usual NYC touristy stuff.

It was October, so it was already dark, and there was a definite chill in the air which caused me to pull my leather jacket more tightly around myself.

I'd decided to sit on a bench while we waited, as Nik's pacing was fraying my nerves.

Unfortunately, the bench was freezing my ass, so I stood back up and nearly walked into my brother who had taken to pacing backwards and forwards up and down the path in front of me.

"This is stupid," I told him, glancing at my watch: 6.29pm. "Why the hell are we here? We're not usually this gullible."

Niko paused in his pacing to raise one blond eyebrow. "Yes we are," he told me. "How many traps have we walked into trying to do the right thing?"

I shrugged. "Meh," I told him. "Is it our fault we're just two big goddamned heroes?"

He snorted, just as my watch ticked onto 6.30pm and we heard a yell from somewhere behind us, further into the park.

Exchanging a, "we are _so_ screwed" glance, we headed in the direction of the sound, only for me to be almost knocked on my ass by a little kid who suddenly appeared out of nowhere and came barrelling into me full pelt.

"Hey, whoa!" I burst out, grabbing hold of the kid's shoulders, more to stabilize myself than to stop him running off. "Where's the fire?"

"M-m-monster," the kid muttered. "Monster."

I blinked at him.

Did he mean me? I mean, there were a lot of monsters in Central Park, but I was undoubtedly the nearest.

He kept glancing over his shoulder, struggling to get out of my grasp.

But he weighed about thirty-five pounds soaking wet and looked like he might fall over if the wind blew too strongly.

"Hey," I repeated, trying to sound sympathetic. "It's okay. You're safe now."

The kid didn't even look at me, just continued to try and wrench his bony shoulders out of my grip.

His t-shirt was about six sizes too big for him, and where it fell off his shoulder there were purple handprints.

I wasn't the first person to grab hold of him recently, and the last person had been a lot less gentle.

"Hey," I said again. "Hey, it's okay."

I was lousy with kids, but knelt down so I was on his level, glancing over his shoulder to where Niko was retracing his steps up the path toward us.

"A little help?" I threw in his direction.

Nik was a lot better with munchkins than I was. He'd had a lot more practice.

It was at this point I realized the kid was trembling and breathing so hard and so fast he was heading towards hyperventilation.

He was still trying to wrench himself free of me when Niko approached, smoothly sheathing his sword before the kid could see it.

"Hey, kid," I tried again. "Where did you come from? Are your parents around someplace?"

He looked up at me then, making eye contact with me for the first time.

He blinked tears out of large gray eyes as he peered at me through a curtain of blond hair.

He shook his head slowly. "I lost my brother," he mumbled. "I don't know where…" he trailed off, glancing again over his shoulder.

It was then I noticed the bruises across his cheekbone and around his throat and the dried blood smeared down the side of his face from a cut over his right eye.

There were deep scratches around his right wrist that looked horribly like claw marks.

I continued to hang on to his shoulders as I did a visual assessment of his condition, as detached as I could be with a kid that looked half scared to death squirming to get out of my grip.

He was painfully thin, dark shadows under large eyes, a mop of too-long blond hair that looked like it hadn't been cut or indeed washed in a while. His clothes were obviously too big for him, and his t-shirt was frayed around the hem with holes in one of the shoulders.

His wrists and upper arms were ringed with ugly purple bruises that matched the one on his cheek and he was only wearing one sneaker, the other foot clad merely in a threadbare blue sock.

I swallowed.

For some reason he seemed eerily familiar and I had the sudden urge to hug him really tightly and not let him go.

"What's your name?" I asked instead.

He blinked at me, choking back an obvious sob.

"I'm Cal," I offered.

He blinked again. "That's my brother's name," he said quietly.

_Okay. So far, so weird._

"What are the odds?" I asked, going for a smile, but not entirely sure I got there.

He blinked at me again, opened cracked lips to say something, thought better of it and closed his mouth once more.

"You have a name?" I tried again.

He glanced over his shoulder one more time.

When he looked back at me, a single tear was making a white track down his dirty face.

"I lost my brother," he said again, rubbing angrily at his cheek. "I need to find my brother. I'm supposed to take care of him."

"Maybe we can help you find him?" I offered. "Me n' _my_ big brother are pretty good at finding people."

"She took him," he said, shaking his head slightly.

"Who?"

He looked at me again, as if gauging how far he could trust me.

Obviously, he decided about as far as he could throw me, as he clammed right the hell back up.

"Are you cold?" I asked. He was shivering.

He shook his head.

"Maybe we should take you someplace warmer?"

He shook his head again. "I need to find my brother…" One more glance over his shoulder. "But the monsters..."

"Let us help you," I offered. "You could start by telling me your name?"

He turned his attention back to me, just as Niko drew level with us.

"It wouldn't kill you, right?" I prodded. "If you told me your name?"

He sighed and shook his head, his skinny shoulders finally slumping in defeat.

"Niko," he said quietly. "My name's Niko."

And that's when the world pretty much stopped spinning.

* * *

"You're staring," Niko—my Niko—pointed out.

I tried to look away but couldn't.

We'd taken the kid to some burger joint across the street from the park. Right now he was sitting opposite us at a regular table in a regular booth on a regular day, his legs swinging as he tucked into a plate of regular fries and regular chicken nuggets.

Chicken.

Go figure.

It was almost normal.

Regular.

Two guys buying junk food for a little kid who looked like he'd been living on the streets for the past two years.

And he had Niko's eyes.

My second thought, obviously, was that maybe Niko wasn't the monk I thought he was and at some point he'd done the dirty with some random one nighter and not come dressed for the party.

But then this was _Niko_ we were talking about, so I knew that wasn't it.

My first thought was too weird, though, even for us.

Nik seemed to be taking it all in his stride, of course.

While I'd crouched there in front of the kid, completely unable to form a coherent thought, let alone a coherent sentence, Niko had taken charge of the situation, pulled off his overshirt and wrapped it around the kid's shoulders and asked him if he wanted to go get something to eat.

The kid had grudgingly agreed, but had continued to keep checking over his shoulder every step of the way.

From the way he was wolfing down his fries, I had the feeling he'd not eaten in a few days.

And I couldn't get over him eating chicken. And junk food.

Niko.

My brother.

Was this my brother?

How the hell was this my brother?

"So how did you get all of those bruises, Niko?" Nik asked.

The kid paused mid-chew. Took a breath. Swallowed. And carried on eating.

Nik seemed unperturbed. "You mentioned monsters?" he continued casually. "Did they do that?"

The kid shook his head.

"So who—?"

"My mom." The kid had stopped eating and was looking right at us.

It was probably the closest I'd seen my big brother come to losing his cool in the last hour.

He blinked once, averted his eyes, fiddled with his mala bead bracelet for a second, and then looked back up at the kid sitting opposite.

"Does that happen often?" he continued, and if anyone else had been listening to him, they might not have noticed the faint catch in his voice.

I wasn't anyone else.

The kid shrugged, and carried on eating.

Nik was studiously not looking at me.

"Well did it?" I asked, not looking at the kid but at my big brother.

Nik didn't shrug, but he didn't reply either.

My memories of our childhood came and went depending on the day and the relative strength of the Tumulus filter. Sometimes I found it hard to focus on anything that had happened to me prior to those two years.

"What's your mom's name?" Nik asked casually.

The kid carried on eating, a tiny line forming between his brows.

"Sophia," he replied at length.

Nik didn't react at all, just nodded gently, like this wasn't the freakiest thing that had ever happened to him.

And he'd seen some freaky shit in his life, let me tell ya.

"How old are you, Niko?" Nik asked, and wasn't this just the definition of how talking to yourself was the first sign of madness?

The kid shrugged.

"You don't know?" Nik asked.

The kid shrugged again.

Something twitched in Nik's cheek. "I don't believe you," he said. "Kid like you, I would think you'd know exactly how old you are."

The kid blinked at him. He did that a lot.

"So you don't count the birthdays she's missed?"

It was my turn to blink at my brother.

The kid ground his teeth a little.

"And you probably have some kind of chart," Nik continued. "So you can keep track of the days?"

The kid actually dropped the chicken nugget he had poised halfway to his mouth.

"To make sure you never miss your little brother's birthday? Right?"

_Oh man..._

The kid sniffed before meeting Nik's gaze defiantly. "I never missed Cal's birthday," he told him, sitting up a little straighter in his seat.

"And how many of those have there been?" Nik asked.

"Two," the kid replied. "He had a cake this time."

"With yellow frosting?" Nik asked.

The kid frowned at him.

Nik nodded, and he was deliberately not looking at me again. "So that makes you, what, six?""

The kid's mouth hung open for a second before he recovered himself sufficiently to ask, "How do you know how old I am?" as his eyes narrowed suspiciously.

Nik shrugged. "Lucky guess," he lied. He paused for a second then, and I could tell he was working out dates in his head. "So where do you live, Niko?" he asked, and I had a feeling he already knew the answer.

The kid didn't reply at first. "Why?" he asked at length. "Does my mom owe you money?"

Wow. There were obviously a lot of things I didn't know about what had happened to my big brother before I became aware of his existence.

"No," Nik assured him. "Would it make a difference if she did?"

The kid shrugged and popped a fry into his mouth absently.

"So Massachusetts, right? Little town outside of Boston?"

The kid's mouth hung open again for a second. "I don't know," he answered at length. "We move around a lot."

"But you like maps, right? So you put a little cross everywhere you've lived?"

The kid actually looked like he might try and bolt right on out of the diner at that, and I had to grab hold of his wrist to keep him in place.

"Are you two perverts?" he asked suddenly. "Because my mom says there are lots of perverts out there and I should be careful because they like little blond boys."

That actually sounded completely like something Sophia would have said to Niko. So much so that his olive skin actually seemed to blanch a little.

"We're not perverts," I answered for him. "We're not gonna hurt you."

"She let some guy drive away with me once," the kid continued. "He was a pervert. Our neighbor said so."

I cast a sidelong glance in Nik's direction, and his cheeks colored a little.

Jesus. I think that might actually have happened.

"He gave her money," the kid continued.

"Christ, she _sold_ you?" I burst out, and I was looking at Nik, not at the kid.

Nik and the kid shrugged in exactly the same way, and I think I actually shuddered.

"The cops found me before he could make me do stuff," the kid supplied, and I wanted to ask him what stuff, but the expression on my big brother's face right then suggested that might not be such a great idea.

Nik cleared his throat. "So is that what happened today?" he asked. "Did your mom let somebody drive away with you?"

I got the horrible impression this was something that had happened more than once.

The kid shook his head and the hand still holding a chicken nugget started to tremble. "It was the—the Grendels," he said slowly.

That was the first time during this whole weird encounter that Nik actually looked at me.

I opened my mouth soundlessly, thought about what I was going to say for a change, and then asked, "How long did you know about them?"

My brother shrugged at me. "Long enough," he murmured, before turning his attention back to the kid. "They're the monsters you mentioned?"

The kid nodded but didn't look up at us, just stared at his fingers, which were now twisted into a ball in his lap.

"What did they do?" Nik persisted.

The kid shrugged, like that was his default setting.

"Did they hurt you?" I asked, and it was my voice that caught this time.

He shrugged again.

"Did they—did they take you someplace?" I almost didn't dare ask him.

They didn't do that. I _know_ they never did that. Not to Niko.

"Was there a bright light? And then it was really dark?"

The kid looked up at that. He stared at me for the longest moment before nodding slowly.

_That did NOT happen._

Did it?

"No," Niko said, without my even having to ask him. "That never happened. I swear to you, Cal."

And I believed him.

At least, I was pretty sure I believed him.

He would have told me. I _know_ he would have told me. He—

"Cal?" Niko said again, his voice firm and unwavering as he caught hold of my wrists and held my hands flat to the table in front of me.

In case _I_ tried to bolt out of the diner.

"Cal, that _never_ happened to me. I swear. Do you hear me?"

I nodded. But I didn't say anything.

Couldn't say anything.

There was a lump in my throat so big it felt like I'd swallowed the Moon.

Niko released me slowly, but kept his right hand gently resting against my left wrist as he turned his attention back to the kid in front of us.

"The—the Grendels," he said slowly. "They came for you?"

The kid nodded.

Niko swallowed visibly. "Do you know why?"

The kid shook his head carefully.

"And they took you through—they took you through a gate?"

The kid frowned at him. "It was like a big hole," he amended. "And one of them picked me up and carried me through. And then I threw up."

I wanted—needed—to ask where they took him, but Nik got his next question out before I could even open my mouth.

"Where was Sophia—your mother, where was your mother when this happened?"

The kid bit his lip and looked up at Nik with big, solemn, suspiciously shiny eyes.

I don't remember seeing Nik cry. Not ever. Not even when we were kids.

Nik handed him a paper napkin and he screwed it up in his hand and just held onto it, not putting it anywhere near his face.

"She took my brother away," the little boy said at length. "When they came. She took him away from me. And then she walked away too."

Nik swallowed hard. "She let them take you?"

The kid nodded. "They gave her money."

I felt Nik's fingers tighten reflexively around my wrist a little, but that was the only outward indication he gave that what the little boy was telling us had in any way affected him.

"Like when they made Cal," the kid added.

It was my turn to blink.

"How…?" I said slowly, and I wasn't sure which version of my brother I was talking to. "How did you…? How old were you when…?"

The kid answered, although I'd been expecting to hear my big brother.

"I know they gave her gold," he said. "She told me. And I saw."

Nik shifted in his seat, once again deliberately not looking at me.

"What did you see?" I asked. And I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

"I was hiding," the kid said. "I was little. It gave her gold. The Grendel. And then it…it…it hurt her. She screamed a lot, and when it was gone there was lots of blood."

I'd never asked.

In twenty-five years I'd never asked him.

"You _saw_?" I asked quietly.

I'd never asked him.

Niko swallowed, his face still angled away from me.

"You _saw_?" I repeated a little more forcefully, and before I knew what I was doing I'd grabbed the shoulder of Nik's coat and yanked him almost out of his seat so his eyes were inches from mine, my other hand going straight to his throat.

He didn't flinch, but the little kid sitting opposite sure as hell did.

"We should talk about this later," Niko suggested, his voice completely calm and devoid of emotion, despite the fact that the pressure I was suddenly putting on his larynx must have been making it difficult for him to speak.

"You saw it _make_ me," I repeated, and I could barely believe it. Could barely believe I'd never asked him. He and Sophia had essentially been living in a tin can at the time of my conception. Nik was four. Where else would he have been?

Nik very gently tried to peel my hand away from his throat. "Cal," he said slowly. "We can talk about this later."

"No, we can talk about this _now_!" I burst out, sounding every bit the brat Niko always told me I was.

Nik sighed, patted the hand I still had wrapped around his throat, before nodding resignedly.

I grudgingly let go of him, and he resumed the position he'd been in before I'd nearly yanked him bodily out of the booth.

"Why don't you ask Niko?" he asked, inclining his head toward the little boy opposite.

I ground my teeth in annoyance. "Because I want to hear it from _you_."

The younger version of my brother was glancing between us, a little perplexed.

"Who _are_ you?" he asked suddenly.

"Niko, what year do you think this is? Do you know?" Nik asked,

The little boy shook his head.

"That's okay," Nik reassured him. "But you remember the Grendel picking you up and taking you through a hole?"

The kid nodded.

"And what was on the other side of the hole?"

I leaned forward, and I knew Nik had asked this question for my benefit.

The boy blinked huge, tear-filled eyes at us. Then he covered his eyes with his hands and started to cry.

_Really_ cry.

I just sat there staring at him for a second, completely unable to move.

My big brother.

_Crying_.

And I thought about the complete train wreck I'd been when I came back from Tumulus, ten years older than this kid, and that just caused my brain to come to a complete and utter stop.

The next thing I was aware of was Niko shoving me out of the booth so he could get past me, and then he was sitting opposite me, his arm around the little boy's trembling shoulders.

He was saying something to him, but I couldn't hear, couldn't understand it, and the kid's sobs slowly started to ebb until eventually he just buried his face against Niko's shoulder and stayed that way for a while.

I was dimly aware of the waitress coming over, of her looking suspiciously at these two guys and this little sobbing kid who was covered in bruises, and I realized maybe it was time to go.

Niko seemed to have come to the same conclusion, and as the waitress turned away—no doubt to bring us to the attention of the two cops sitting in the corner nursing black coffees—he threw a few bills on the table and picked the kid up, cradling him against his shoulder without him even having to move his head from where he currently had it buried.

"We should go," Nik said, and I nodded, following him out of the booth and heading straight for the door.

I heard someone yell at us as we left, but we moved quickly, ducking down an alleyway opposite that eventually led to the nearest subway stop.

"Where are we going?" I finally managed to ask, as we headed down the slippery, worn steps and toward the platforms.

Niko met my questioning gaze with a question of his own.

He didn't know.

My brother didn't know what to do.

"Maybe Robin...?" he hazarded hesitantly.

I shrugged. "What's the worst that could happen?"

* * *

The worst that could happen was Robin Goodfellow answering his door with only a black satin sheet wrapped around his hips.

"You have a—" he stumbled, "—child."

"Yes we do," Niko agreed, shouldering Goodfellow out of the way and pushing his way into the condo.

I followed him a little less agressively.

I'd seen my brother around kids before, but never seen this fiercely protective streak. Well, not since _I_ was a kid anyway.

Robin blinked hard before closing the door and turning slowly back into the apartment.

"Why?" he asked uncertainly, and Niko glanced briefly at him on his way toward the guest bathroom.

"Why what?" he returned.

Robin blinked again, his hand fisting a little tighter in his sheet, which he'd no doubt planned on dropping "accidentally" when he first realized it was Niko at his front door.

"Why do you have a child?"

Nik had lowered his younger self to the floor and was ushering him into the bathroom.

"I'm going to put the shower on for you," he explained quietly. "You need to wash all that blood off. Think you can do that?"

The little boy turned wide eyes onto him and nodded.

"You want me to stay and help?"

The kid shook his head.

"Okay," Nik said, turning on the shower. "You clean yourself up. I'll find you some clothes, okay?"

The kid nodded again, and Nik carefully backed out of the bathroom, pulling the door to but not completely closing it.

When he turned back to us he stopped and drew a long breath.

"I think I need a drink," he announced, heading towards Robin's kitchen.

Robin's mouth opened and closed several times, but no words came out.

"Mine's a beer," I told my brother, slumping down on Robin's ridiculously expensive couch as Nik threw me a cold bottle pilfered from the puck's cavernous fridge, before opening one of his own.

Which he pretty much downed half of.

In one gulp.

With the fridge door still open.

Goodfellow glanced from Niko to me and back to Niko again, before his gaze slid in the direction of the bathroom door.

"What...? What did...?"

Robin speechless was about as unusual as Nik drinking alcohol.

My brother pretty much collapsed onto the couch beside me before downing the other half of his beer.

Robin clenched his jaw and scowled at us both, pulling the sheet even tighter in protest.

"Is someone going to tell me what in _Hades_ is going on?" he demanded, the tips of his ears turning an interesting shade of purple. "Who _is_ that child? And why do _you_ two have custody of him?"

Obviously the sight of a little blond moppet with Nik's eyes might have led Robin to the same conclusion I'd initially reached.

When neither of us answered, Robin seemed to soften a little. "Niko, I'm all for you perpetuating your beauty, but this seems a little...sudden."

Nik didn't even rise to the bait. "Not my son," was all he managed to say before he laid his head back against the couch cushions and closed his eyes.

I took pity on Robin. "He's had a heavy day," I explained. "Not every day you meet your six year old self running through the middle of Central Park claiming he's being chased by monsters."

Robin blinked at me. "He what now?"

"Time travel," Niko murmured. "Why not. We seem to have done everything else."

"He's been gated," I told my brother. "And he's been to Tumulus."

Nik studiously kept his eyes closed.

"But he can't have been there long," I persisted, "or he would have aged like I did."

Nik finally cracked open one eye. "So if going to Tumulus didn't shove him forward in time twenty years, what did?"

I shrugged. "A gate couldn't have done that. Not on its own."

Robin cleared his throat impatiently. "Is this a private conversation, or can anyone join in?"

Niko opened his other eye and sat up a little straighter. "Make yourself useful," he said shortly. "The child needs clothes."

Robin squinted at him. "Because children's clothing is something I'm likely to have lying around my condo."

Nik's expression never faltered. "Call a minion. I hear you have many."

Robin huffed as he spun on his heel and headed for his room. "I'll put him in a pink dress. That's what I'll do. Frills. And lots of them."

He was still mumbling as he closed his bedroom door behind himself, none-too-gently.

Just as the front door and the guest bathroom door opened simultaneously.

Ishiah entered the condo just as kid Niko stuck his head out of the bathroom, and the two of them just looked at each other for a very long moment.

It was the kid who spoke first.

"Angel," he murmured, eyes wide and full of awestruck wonder.

Ishiah swallowed. "Ah," he said. "This could be awkward."

* * *

My brother had been a Buddhist for as long as I could remember.

Before that, he'd been undecided.

I didn't remember him ever having a thing for angels, though.

The little boy currently gazing at Ishiah like he was Batman, Spider-Man and Wolverine all rolled into one, however, obviously had a thing for angels.

"You—you—you saved me," he whispered, clutching at the towel wrapped around himself like a security blanket.

I didn't remember Niko ever having a security blanket, either.

The older version of my brother had jumped to his feet at the sound of his younger self leaving the bathroom, and I'm pretty sure it was because he didn't like the idea of any version of himself being in any way naked in front of Robin Goodfellow.

The puck himself was still dressing, but had obviously heard Ishiah's entrance into the condo, his disembodied voice carrying easily through his bedroom door. "My love, there is currently a naked child dripping water onto my marble floor. Unless you'd like to clean up the puddles, I suggest you clothe him immediately."

Ishiah and the younger version of my brother seemed rooted to the spot as they simply stared at one another.

My Niko frowned at his younger self. "What do you mean, he 'saved' you?" he asked slowly.

The kid blinked at Ishiah, then turned his attention to my brother.

"In—in—the m-monsters' place…" he said slowly. "There was an angel. An angel came and rescued me."

Ishiah said nothing for the longest time, before suddenly announcing, "I'll go and speak to Mrs. Bannerman downstairs. She has a child his age. Perhaps she can lend us some clothes."

And with that, he was gone.

And it was just me, Nik and…the other Nik standing looking at one another.

Nik—my Nik—broke the silence first.

"How did the angel 'rescue you?'" he asked casually.

His younger self clutched the towel even tighter.

"There were monsters everywhere," he said slowly. "I was really scared. And—and holes like the one I was taken through kept opening and more of them kept coming out of them—" his narration was picking up speed and hysteria the more he told us, "—and then there was an angel behind me with black and gold wings and he told me not to be afraid and he put his arms around me and when another hole opened and another monster came through, he picked me up and carried me through the hole before it closed behind us, and then I—I lost him and, and then I was—I was here and I was in a park and it was dark and cold and I didn't know where I was and I couldn't find my brother and—and—" he finally stopped to draw breath. "And then there was you."

Nik swallowed. "The angel didn't come out of the hole with you?"

Niko shook his head.

Nik turned his attention in my direction. "The gate Darkling built," he said slowly. Always Darkling. Never me. Never my fault. "It was a gate through time, correct?"

I nodded. "Back to a time before humans."

"So when the angel—the Peri—sent Niko through one of the Auphe gates—"

I caught my brother's drift. "That Auphe could have been travelling through time as well as space?"

Nik nodded. "Is that possible? We know gates can be two-way. And we know they can move through time."

I thought about it for a second. "I don't know," I answered honestly. "But it's as good an explanation as anything else we've come up with."

"We haven't come up with anything else," Nik commented drily.

"Exactly," I returned.

Ishiah chose that moment to return to the condo, just as Robin entered the lounge now, thankfully, fully dressed. The Peri was clutching a pile of clothes, which he tentatively offered to the younger version of my brother.

Niko resumed staring at him wide-eyed and I wondered how he knew Ishiah was an "angel" when he hadn't seen his wings.

"These are for you," Ishiah told the boy, and Niko nodded mutely, taking the clothes and backing away slowly before turning tail and disappearing back into the bathroom.

Ishiah shifted his weight awkwardly from foot to foot.

"So?" I demanded. "Care to explain?"

Ishiah sighed. "There's a legend..." he began slowly. "A folk tale. A myth. Of a Peri who relived millennia in order to save the life of one child."

"'Relived?'" Nik echoed. "What does that mean?"

Ishiah scratched the back of his neck uncomfortably. "I never realized..." he murmured. "Never thought..." He stopped himself, suddenly looking up at Nik and myself sharply.

"I think there's someone you should meet."

* * *

The Peri who followed Ishiah into Robin's apartment some two hours later was tall and built and looked like he'd seen some serious shit.

He had a patch of puckered skin on his left cheek that had that plastic, melted look of someone who had been injured in a fire and he had a scar above his right eye that looked somehow familiar.

"This is Micah," Ishiah introduced the newcomer, and he merely gazed at us with piercing blue eyes that seemed weathered and tired, as if they'd witnessed far too much for one lifetime.

His hair was long, almost as long as Nik's, but dark, wild and untamed and when his eyes lit on my brother, he squinted a little uncertainly.

"Which one are you?" he demanded, and Nik squinted on back at him.

"I'm not sure what you mean," he admitted, tilting his head slightly. "I know you," he added at length. "How is that possible?"

The Peri didn't reply, just shook out impressive black and gold wings for a second, before scanning the apartment dispassionately.

"You have something that belongs to me," he announced, raising his head a little, turning as the younger version of my brother appeared in the hallway, rubbing at his eyes after waking from the nap he'd been taking in one of the guest rooms.

He blinked when he saw Micah, his hand dropping immediately to one side.

The Peri set his jaw, his entire posture stiffening, before striding over to the child, coming to a halt in front of him, and towering over him almost menacingly.

"Whoa, hey—" I began to protest, and Nik had already gone for his katana.

Micah ignored us pointedly.

"Are you injured?" he demanded of the child, and Niko shook his head mutely, eyes wide as he gazed up at the Peri. "Did these people harm you?"

Niko shook his head again.

The Peri reached down to him, taking his chin in strong fingers and tilting his head from side to side, and I saw Nik's equally strong fingers tighten around the hilt of his sword preemptively.

Micah nodded. "You are safe," he intoned, his voice still flat and emotionless. He took a breath. Bowed his head slightly. "You are safe," he repeated, and this time his voice cracked on the last word and it was as if his entire body crumpled right in front of us. "You are safe."

Kneeling down in front of the child version of my brother, Micah bowed his head before him, laid one hand on his narrow chest above his heart and promptly burst into silent sobbing that wracked his shoulders and caused his entire body to tremble.

I glanced at Nik, who had lowered his sword, and then at Ishiah, whose face had contorted into something resembling both sympathy and agony.

The younger version of my brother paused for a second before laying a small hand on the Peri's giant shoulder.

"I knew you'd find me."

Micah looked up at him, blinking unshed tears from his eyes before taking the boy in his arms and hugging him like the future of the human race depended on it.

"To the ends of the earth and the ends of time," Micah murmured into Niko's hair. "I would have waited forever."

"You _did _wait forever," Ishiah put in then. "I am sorry I did not believe you, brother. Had I known... Had I known _who _your charge had been..."

Micah stood then, arms still wrapped around the little boy in front of him, who he lifted up onto his hip as if he weighed nothing.

"_Is_," the Peri intoned. "Not _had been_. He _is_ my charge. Past, present and future."

I glanced over at Robin then, and the Puck shrugged at me. "I have no idea."

"Some of us," Ishiah tried to explain, "when we were still...before we were Peri—"

"Angels," the younger version of Niko whispered, laying his head against Micah's shoulder.

Ishiah nodded slightly. "Back then," he agreed. "Some of us were charged with protecting specific humans thoughout their lifetime. It was a special duty. An honor."

"Guardian angels?" Nik hazarded, and Ishiah nodded.

"I failed," Micah said quietly. "I failed in my task. I did not know. Did not understand. Timelines and altered realities and children who could disappear from one time to reappear in another." He stopped himself abruptly, shaking his head. "I had given up all hope and all understanding and I should be punished." He turned to face myself and Nik, lifting his chin slightly. "You should punish me for my ignorance and my weakness and my failure to understand and to protect you."

Nik blinked at him and so did I.

And then my brother straightened, fingers tightening around the hilt of the katana he still held, his jaw tensing.

"If you are our guardian angel," he demanded tightly, "why did you not save Cal? Why did you not save him from the Auphe? From Tumulus?"

My brother was practically vibrating with indignant anger.

"Nik—" I began.

"I tried," Micah informed him. "Believe me." He shifted slightly, averting his gaze. "But he is not my charge. I was not there for him."

Niko blinked at him again.

"Then who...?" he stumbled. "Why would you...? How did you...?"

It was a rare thing indeed when my brother was unable to finish a sentence.

"You're _Niko_'s guardian angel?" I finished for him.

Micah shook his head. "Not this one," he said indicating my brother with a wave of his hand. "Not in this time. Perhaps. My understanding is...lacking and I am justly ashamed. But still. I failed him. I failed all of them."

Niko frowned at him mutely.

"For once, Niko," Robin drawled, "you're allowed to admit you don't understand something."

Nik turned his attention briefly to Robin, before glancing back at the Peri.

"I don't understand."

Micah sighed. "When you were eighteen. When the Auphe came for your brother. When they tried to burn you to ash along with the harlot who birthed you—" He ducked his head slightly. "No offence meant."

Nik shrugged. "None taken."

"You couldn't break the glass. Remember? The flames were all around you and your mother was screaming in agony and you couldn't break the window?"

Niko shifted uncomfortably. "I remember," he said tightly.

Micah nodded. "Suddenly the window blew inwards. You recall? Against all the odds?"

Niko swallowed. "I—I remember," he repeated. "I'd thought it was...a miracle."

"That someone was watching over you?" Micah nodded. "I was."

"You did that?"

"I broke the glass. I ensured you were able to escape. That you had survived. And then..." the Peri trailed off.

"Then?" Nik prompted him. "What happened then?"

Micah swallowed. "I had no experience with the Auphe," he admitted. "Save for knowing what they looked like. I saw them take your brother. Saw them drag him through a hole in the world as he screamed your name."

It was my turn to swallow.

Yeah, not one of my fondest memories.

"Once I was sure you were safe, I tried to save your brother, but the Auphe were too fast. They took him through one of their gates and I was too slow to follow them. But I followed one of the others. One of the monsters. As it opened its gate, I jumped through after it, expecting to emerge wherever they had taken Caliban but—"

"I wasn't there?" I hazarded, swallowing the lump forming in my throat.

Micah shook his head. "I had expected to emerge on Tumulus, but I found myself still on Earth. Massachusetts to be precise. In 1990."

Niko frowned. "I thought the Auphe could only effect time travel because of Darkling? Because of his power. When he opened the gate to Earth's prehistoric past."

"I did not know of Darkling's actions at that time," Micah said. "His attempts to open his gate were fourteen years in my future. But I learned of them after. And believe perhaps the sheer power of his gate was enough to affect the way all Auphe gates worked for some time, enabling them to travel not only in space but in time as well. Over limited distances only. A few years. Nothing like the scale of what Darkling had tried to achieve for them."

"So you found yourself in 1990?" I prompted. "Where this Niko—" I indicated the little boy in Micah's arms, "—came from?"

The Peri nodded. "I saw my own past. I saw myself slaughtered. I saw the Auphe tear me to pieces before taking my charge from me."

"How is that possible?" Nik asked softly, carefully sheathing his katana.

"I don't know," Micah admitted. "They slaughtered me in my past. I should have ceased to be in my present."

"A different timeline, perhaps?" Robin hazarded. "A different reality?"

"I know not," Micah admitted. "But the child—the Niko Leandros I had been charged with watching over since the day of his brother's conception—to me, he was the same. And with his protector gone, his mother stood by and let the Auphe take him."

Nik took a breath. Composed himself a little. Experimentally tried to unclench his jaw. "That did not happen to me."

"No," Micah agreed. "Nor to me. I watched the Auphe I had followed through their gate slaughter my other self and take the child into another tear in reality and I...I knew I had to follow, whether this was _my _timeline, _my _Niko Leandros or not."

"You followed them through their gate again?" Robin clarified. "Even though you had just witnessed your own death?"

Micah shrugged. "My charge was in mortal danger. In that moment I did not know what the Auphe had planned for Caliban, but I had a good idea what they had planned for his brother."

"And that would be...?" Nik prompted.

Micah blinked. "I had assisted you in escaping from certain death at their hands when they took your brother," he said. "For my trouble I was marked." He indicated the burn to his face. "When they failed to destroy you, I believe they chose an earlier time to take you, a time when you were more vulnerable, when I was not expecting an assault. A time when they could kill us both rather than risk us derailing their plans for your brother."

"Then they should have killed me at Darkling's gate," Nik pointed out.

Micah shook his head. "It would have been too late by then. The damage was already done."

"What damage?" I asked.

Micah appraised me for a long moment. "The Auphe realized, as I did much later, that your brother was a humanizing influence on you; that without him, you would have been theirs to command much sooner and with far less of a struggle on your part."

He was right.

I knew that, and so did Niko.

"He taught you morality," Micah continued. "Right from wrong. Kindness. Empathy. Bravery. Selflessness. All the things your mother would never have taught you. All the things that kept you human. All the things that helped you save the world from the Auphe."

I swallowed and studiously did not look at my brother.

"Without him, I would have Unmade the World," I agreed.

Niko made no comment, merely shifted his weight slightly. "So they decided to take me to Tumulus when killing me didn't work?" he managed.

"I did not know that was where they were taking you," Micah admitted. "I merely followed. As soon as I emerged from the gate I knew where I was. He—" he inclined his head in the direction of the child in his arms, "—was still there where I emerged. There were many Auphe crowded around him, teeth bared, claws raised. I had no doubt they intended to eviscerate him."

"And you fought them?" Nik asked a little incredulously. "A crowd of Auphe? You fought them to save...to save _me_?"

"A version of you."

"That scar," I said, indicating the mark above his eye. "An Auphe did that to you?"

Micah nodded. "I was marked each time I failed my charge," he said. "I fought many of them that day. Tried to run, take the boy, get away from them. But there were so many, so many, all hell bent on his murder. I knew I could not fight them all."

"What did you do?" I asked, almost wishing Micah had followed _me _to Tumulus. "How did you save him?"

Micah shrugged. "There were many gates," he said. "Incoming and outgoing. Up to that point I had only followed an Auphe as it departed. I was desperate. We were about to die. A gate opened above us and Auphe rained down upon us and I—I wrapped my wings around the child and propelled us upwards, into the gate—"

"An incoming gate?" I clarified, thinking back to Nik's earlier suggestion about two-way gates.

Micah nodded. "I had no way to know what would happen. Whether we would survive. It was turmoil, like being inside a tornado. I tried to hold on to Niko but he—he was ripped away from me and I did not see him again."

"Until the gate spit him out here?" I guessed.

Micah nodded.

"Where did the gate take _you_?" Nik asked.

Micah swallowed, straightening. "I can only presume I jumped into whatever space exists where Auphe gates intersect at the exact moment Darkling opened his gate up in the future. The power was immense and I was thrown backwards many, many years. To the destination Darkling had intended to send his Auphe masters."

I sucked in a breath. "Prehistoric Earth?" I burst out. "You were gated to _prehistoric Earth_?"

Micah nodded just once. "As I arrived, Darkling's gate closed. I slaughtered the few Auphe that managed to get through. But once the gate closed, there were no more Auphe. And no more gates."

"You were trapped in the distant past?" Robin put in.

"Yes," Micah confirmed. "I had no way to return to my own time. I saw it as a fitting punishment for my failure."

"And then what?"

Micah considered me for a second. "I waited," he said at length. "I saw your civilization grow. I saw your history unfold as it was intended, not as the Auphe had intended for it to be destroyed. And I waited and watched, determined that I would one day find the child I had lost and return him to his home." He glanced down at the boy in his arms. "Today is that day."

"Did you not try to intervene?" Nik asked. "In 1990, when you caught up. When the Auphe—when the Auphe came for—for him?"

"I tried," Micah confirmed. "But nothing I did helped. I saw a version of myself destroyed and a second version throw himself through a gate. All I could do then was wait until I could help save you once again when the Auphe tried to burn you along with your mother."

Nik grimaced. "But if I was abducted in 1990," he asked carefully, "how could I have still existed twelve years later?"

"I have asked myself this question," Micah agreed. "My only conclusion is that your six year old self was successfully returned to his own time in order for you to still exist in 2002."

"But we haven't done that yet," Nik pointed out.

"No," Micah agreed. "But it must come to pass otherwise you will cease to be."

Niko swallowed.

"In the words of Marty McFly," I said, "This is heavy."

"How do we achieve this?" Robin put in suddenly. "I don't happen to know anyone with a time machine, do you?"

Ishiah sighed. "The Auphe are destroyed," he said. "It's not like we can just hijack one of their gates."

Robin was suddenly looking at me pointedly.

I straightened. "No," I said shortly. "I can't."

Nik seemed to catch Robin's drift and grimaced at him. "That wasn't Cal," he pointed out, as he always did. "It was Darkling, Cal just—"

"Opened the gate," Robin finished.

Micah raised an eyebrow. "I know what your role was in the Auphe's plan," he said to me. "I know you possess the ability to open a gate through space. But time?"

"You said there was residual power from Darkling's gate that enabled the Auphe to travel in time after Darkling's gate failed," Robin pointed out. "Does that energy remain?"

Micah shrugged. "I know not."

"It's been five years since that happened," I pointed out.

"In linear time," Robin agreed. "Maybe, were we to recreate Darkling's attempt—"

"_No!"_ both myself and Niko barked at the same time.

"That is _not_ happening," Niko added.

"I can't," I shook my head vehemently. "I can't do that again. Not without a freakin' _banshee—_"

"You don't need a banshee," Robin countered. "If we go back to that place, where that warehouse in Brooklyn once stood—"

"No," Niko renewed his protest, as a trickle of cold sweat began to form along my spine. "He is not going through that again—"

"—Cal could perhaps tap into some of that residual energy," Robin continued. "Enough to open a gate to 1990–"

"I don't think I can do that—"

"How is he supposed to know how to open a gate to 1990?" Nik demanded.

"I can't exactly Google it," I agreed.

"He could open a gate to 1900 or 1890 or 2090 and then what happens?" Nik continued to protest.

"You can open a gate to anywhere you've been before, correct?" Robin persisted.

"Yes, but I was two years old in 1990 and—"

"And you were _there_. When the Auphe took your six year old brother. That's what you said, isn't it?" Robin turned his attention to Micah. "You said Sophia walked away. With Cal in her arms. Cal was _there._"

I swallowed.

And Micah nodded. "Yes," he confirmed slowly. "Caliban was present when his brother was taken."

"But wouldn't that be a different Cal?" Nik put in. "The one whose brother was abducted by the Auphe when he was six?"

Micah shrugged. "Yes, that is correct. But it is also correct that I should not exist. And yet here I stand."

Robin turned back to me triumphantly. "You've been there. At that place, at that time. You can do this."

* * *

I couldn't do this.

The warehouse where Darkling and I had built the Auphe their gate had long since gone, destroyed completely when The Vigil did their clean-up after the Auphe, Darkling—_we_—almost ended the world.

But the ley lines were still here.

We were standing in a parking lot, one solitary girder all that was left of the original structure that had been here five years ago.

But I could still feel the power thrumming beneath my feet.

The power Darkling had tapped into and channelled in order to take my gate back to the distant, prehistoric past.

The prehistoric past where Micah had existed, waiting to save my brother's life thousands of years later.

I shuddered.

I didn't pretend to understand alternate timelines, multiverses, all that _Star Trek_ crap.

All I knew was there was a little boy standing three feet away from me who needed to get home, and if that didn't happen, there was a good chance my brother might cease to exist.

Incentive enough to try.

Even if the thought of what I was about to try and do scared me shitless.

Nik was standing in front of me, looking at me, disapproving and anxious and concerned and self-sacrificing and all those things he'd been my whole life that had always kept me as safe as he possibly could.

"I don't want you to do this," he said softly, one hand gentle on my shoulder. "It's not worth it."

_I'm not worth it._

He didn't need to say it.

I knew what he was thinking.

It wasn't worth my risking myself—the world, Time itself—to ensure he continued to exist. He wasn't worth it. He never thought he was worth it.

If our positions had been reversed, he would have torn down Heaven and Hell to make sure _I _survived.

But when it came to him?

Our mother might have detested me, but she always drilled into Niko how unimportant he was by comparison. Whether he still believed that, I wasn't sure, but he'd had a part in saving the world enough times by now that I was pretty sure he ought to have a little bit more self-worth than Sophia had left him with.

I glanced over at the little kid who was standing gazing up at Micah in complete awe.

I never saw Niko like that. As a kid. He was always the grown-up, the one who took care of me, even when he was only a kid himself.

"Just this one time," I said slowly, still looking at the child version of my brother, "you have to let someone else be the grown-up, Nik. You have to let _me _take care of _you _for a change."

I refocused my gaze on the adult version of my brother.

And paused.

"Nik?"

I could see straight through him.

I could see Robin standing behind him, Ishiah by his side.

I could see the street beyond the parking lot.

Through Niko's chest.

"Nik!"

It must have been the obvious tone of alarm in my voice, but suddenly everyone was looking at my brother.

And he was looking at me.

His hand was still on my shoulder, but I couldn't feel it at all.

"What's happening?" I demanded of no one in particular. "Nik!"

Niko was trying to say something to me, his mouth opening and closing, but I couldn't hear anything, and the child version of my brother suddenly yelped.

"Make it stop!" the kid yelled, covering his face with his hands. "It hurts!"

Robin moved so that he was standing directly behind where adult Niko was rapidly fading out into nothing, grabbing my shoulders as if my brother wasn't even there and shaking me, hard.

"Now, Cal!" he yelled urgently. "You need to do it _now _or there's going to be nothing left of your brother to save!"

I blinked at him stupidly. "I don't—"

"He's being erased from time," Ishiah explained. "His child self has been gone too long. His timeline is resetting. Without him in it."

I swallowed. "I don't think I can—" I started to say uncertainly, but then what was left of my brother, the faint resonance I could still see, said one word that I read on his lips.

_Goodbye._

No.

This wasn't goodbye.

How could this be goodbye?

We'd saved the world together. Repeatedly. It couldn't end like this!

"Robin, you might want to take a step back," I informed him, straightening my shoulders and setting my jaw. "This might pinch a little."

The gate I opened in front of me, right where Niko has been standing, wasn't like any other gate I'd opened before.

Except maybe the one Darkling helped me open.

The colors were different, the sound, the _energy_ of it.

It felt _different._

Other.

Wrong.

When I looked through to the other side I could see Sophia.

I could see Sophia holding a small child.

I could see Sophia holding _me._

In my entire life I didn't remember my mother ever touching me. Not once.

But in the world beyond my gate, she was holding me.

And she was walking away as the Auphe set about killing my six-year-old brother.

"This is _his _timeline," Robin quickly realized, indicating the little boy whose hand Micah was now gripping tightly. "This is the 1990 where you were present as an infant when Micah took him through time."

I watched, unmoving, as I saw the Peri on the other side of the gate overpowered and eviscerated by twenty homicidal Auphe as another version of Micah picked up my brother and dragged him into a gate...followed by another Micah. This one was whole and uninjured, having stepped through another gate, presumably from the future where he had saved my eighteen-year-old brother from burning to death in the trailer with our mother.

I blinked.

I saw _this _Micah leap through the gate where Niko had been taken, too fast for the Auphe who had just torn the first version of the Peri, the one from that reality, to pieces.

They flooded after him, even as he disappeared, and all I could see was my mother walking away with my two-year-old self in her arms.

"Cal!" I heard the little boy holding Micah's hand yell. "I need to find my brother."

He tried to squirm out of the Peri's grip, but Micah clearly had no intention of losing him again.

"We go together," he told the child. "This time I save you."

Niko looked up at him, eyes saucer-big. He nodded, just once.

Micah lifted him up onto his hip, huge black and gold wings shimmering into existence at his back as he stepped toward the gate I'd made to save my brother.

For a second the gate shimmered and there were two Auphe standing on the other side.

Looking at me.

They both grinned a metal-toothed grin, the word, "Cousin," grinding from their lips as they moved towards me.

I froze completely.

"Cal!" Ishiah suddenly screamed at me. "Close the gate! Close it! They can't come through here! We can't risk this reality for one person!"

I tore my gaze from the Auphe for one second, looking at Ishiah and for an instant unable to understand what he meant.

"Cal, close the gate!" the Peri repeated.

Robin was looking from Ishiah to me and back again, and then his eyes lit on Niko, who even now appeared to be screwing his face up in agony as his left arm began to disappear.

"Micah, can you do this?" Robin demanded, indicating the gate, the two Auphe gazing at us, and the ten standing over the alternate version of Micah's body.

The Peri seemed to grow about a foot in height as he shook out his wings to their full span.

"They _will not _best me again," he assured the Puck.

"Then go!" Robin ordered. "Go now! Save the boy or this world and every world he helped to save dies with him!"

Micah nodded once, and then he was running for the gate, Niko clutched to his chest, oblivious to the two Auphe running towards him—towards _me—_jumping through into their world just as they jumped into ours.

"Cal, close the gate!" Robin ordered.

But I couldn't.

I couldn't move.

Distantly, I saw Robin and Ishiah lunge at the two Auphe running towards me, but all I could focus on was what was happening beyond the gate, Micah still clutching the child version of my brother to his chest as he swung his sword at the Auphe who hadn't returned to Tumulus with that Niko's earlier self, lopping off two of their heads before they even registered he was there.

I couldn't breathe, couldn't think, could only watch in mute horror as the remaining Auphe turned as one towards the Peri and my brother—his survival the only hope I had of getting _my _Niko back.

They swarmed towards them, Micah's sword still swinging, but my view was obscured by several more of them jumping through the gate towards me.

One of the two who had already arrived had had his head separated from his shoulders by Goodfellow's sword, but the other had Ishiah on the defensive even as Robin turned to take on the other four who had crossed over into our world.

Dimly, I knew if any of them survived, our world was doomed.

Just as surely as I knew that if that little boy on the other side of the gate died, our world was just as doomed.

"Cal!" Robin yelled at me. "Close the damn gate and _help us_!"

I blinked at him.

Blinked back into the gate

I couldn't see Micah or my brother, there were too many Auphe surrounding them, more and more as gates opened around them as reinforcements catapulted themselves into the fray.

"Nik!" I cried out as if to warn him, even as I heard Ishiah cry out in pain and Robin scream something in Greek that sounded horribly like a war cry.

The Auphe reinforcements weren't only attacking Micah.

They were coming for us too.

"Cal, close the gate!" Robin yelled again, and I could see blood on his face, teeth marks on his neck, and Ishiah was down, two Auphe on him.

And then I couldn't see anything because I was lying on my back with an Auphe on top of me, his needle teeth an inch from my neck as he breathed, "Now you die, cousin."

I sucked in a breath.

Too late I reached for my Desert Eagle, fingers cramped and useless with the effort of holding open the gate for so long.

"Close the gate, Cal."

Even as I heard the words, the Auphe lurched as if to rip out my throat, his head suddenly falling to one side and to the ground as his torso fell in the opposite direction.

I gulped in a breath.

"Cal, close the gate!"

Niko was standing over me, bloody katana held in his hand and an expression on his face that was probably the closest to confused he was ever likely to get.

"Cal, goddamn it, _now_!" he added, slightly less gently.

I closed the gate.

And he turned, katana already swinging as he took the heads off both of the Auphe attacking Ishiah before turning his attention to the three attacking Robin.

He skewered the first one from behind, the surprised look on Robin's face an image I'd probably take to my grave as the Puck quickly recovered his senses enough to slice the second Auphe up the entire length of his torso.

I swallowed as a gate opened to my right, expecting more Auphe to come pouring out, but instead the last Auphe standing made a run for it, and this time I didn't hesitate in finding my Desert Eagle.

The Auphe took six rounds to the head and another two to the chest, just to be sure.

The last gate closed with a pop, and for a second I just lay there, my gun still clutched in both hands as my brother turned to look at me.

His face was streaked with blood, but I was fairly sure it wasn't his own.

Robin had already rushed to Ishiah's side, but the Peri was moving, a good indication he'd survived.

Assured of their wellbeing, Niko strode over to me, holding out his hand towards me before grinning uncharacteristically.

"Nothing like popping back into existence in the middle of an Auphe attack to get the blood pumping," he said, gripping my hand and pulling me roughly to my feet. "Maybe we should make it a regular part of our exercise regimen."

When I didn't let go of him, he squinted at me quizzically.

"Cal, are you okay?" he asked, smile faltering. "Cal? Are you injured?"

I could see his eyes darting over me, performing the same visual triage I'd seen him perform a hundred times before.

I shook my head at him. "I'm fine, Cyrano," I told him, still clinging to his hand. "I'm fine now."

And then I broke the cardinal sin of brotherhood by pulling him into a bone-crushing hug that had him hesitating before he returned the favor.

"This is awkward," he told me, as I still refused to let go of him.

"Missed you, big brother," I said.

"Cal, I was probably only gone a matter of minutes and—"

"Nik, just this one time shut up and enjoy the moment," I told him. "It might never happen again."

* * *

"So kid Niko must have survived," I hazarded, laying my head back against Robin's ridiculously expensive couch cushions as I paused between mouthfuls of well-deserved, equally as expensive German beer. "For you to be here?"

Niko was at my side, probably a lot closer to me than usual, simply because I hadn't let him more than an arm's length out of my reach since he reappeared in our timeline.

"I would presume that to be the case," he agreed thoughtfully.

"What was it like, being erased from time?" Robin asked, sitting opposite us while he dabbed at the cut above Ishiah's eye with an alcohol wipe. His own injuries had already been tended to by Niko, which I'm sure had been the highlight of his month.

Niko shrugged. "I was talking to Cal," he said thoughtfully. "And then Cal was on the floor with an Auphe about to rip out his throat. All very instantaneous and a little bit disconcerting."

"Only you would refer to disappearing from reality to reappear with a monster in front of you about to kill your brother as 'disconcerting,'" I observed, taking a swig of my beer. "Normal people would probably call that 'terrifying.'"

Niko shrugged again.

"We should find Micah," Ishiah suggested, wincing slightly at Robin's medical ministrations. "If he survived, he should still be around in this timeline."

"My people are already looking," Robin informed us casually. "Either he retired once he realized Niko was actually quite adept at looking after himself and might not need a guardian angel," he continued, "or he's living in an apartment block across the street from you where he can keep an eye on you at all times."

Niko and I shuddered simultaneously.

"Because that's not creepy at all," I observed.

"We should find him and thank him," Nik added. "He appears to have saved my life many times over in more than one timeline." He reached out for the bottle of liquid grass or whatever the hell Robin had put on the coffee table for him. "Who knew I had two guardian angels?"

"Two?" Robin echoed with a squint.

Niko took a drink from the bottle. "I always thought _you _were our guardian angel, Robin."

I snickered, suddenly frowning as I noticed a mark on my brother's wrist where his shirt sleeve had ridden up a little.

I caught hold of his arm and he frowned at me.

"We're holding hands now too?"

"What's this?" I demanded, ignoring the jibe.

Niko's frowned deepened. "What's what?" He disengaged himself from me, carefully putting his bottle of juice back on the coffee table before examining his wrist himself.

I knew all of Niko's scars. Just like he knew all of mine. And I'd never seen the ghost of claw marks around his right wrist before.

Auphe claw marks.

"That's..." he started to say, tipping his head slightly to one side as he considered. "...Odd."

Robin sat forward on the couch a little. "What is it?" he asked, trying to get a look at Niko's wrist.

"Scars," I told him. "Scars he didn't have before."

Niko continued to frown before his expression cleared a little. "From when the Auphe grabbed me and took me through the gate to Tumulus," he said neutrally, as if that should be obvious. "That's one of the reasons I eventually started wearing metal bracelets. To protect my wrists. I realized their vulnerability and—"

"You never went to Tumulus," I interrupted him.

"Not in this timeline, anyway," Robin added.

We let that sink in for a second.

"Do you—" I hesitated. Swallowed. "Do you remember Tumulus?"

Niko thought about it, biting his lip uncertainly before answering, "Yes. I think I do. But...with the memory of a child, not as an adult. Not like when we delivered the suitcase nuke. It's more of...an impression. Something that happened for an instant that I try not to remember. But I remember the smell of it. Like sulfur. And the Auphe surrounding me. And...and black wings and..." He swallowed. "I remember Micah. I remember him carrying me back through the gate before he lost me. I—I remember coming _here_." He glanced at me, then at Robin and Ishiah. "I remember all of you and...and I remember _me_." He blinked. "I remember meeting the adult version of me. How—how do I remember that?"

Robin inclined his head slightly. "The child Micah returned to his timeline?" he said. "I'm guessing that became you. He might not have been you prior to his coming here. But now he is."

Niko frowned at him, and I was glad I wasn't the only one whose head hurt from thinking about what Robin just said.

"Our timelines converged?" Niko hazarded. "So the experience became circular. For me."

"Time loop," I said, knowingly. "Hate when that happens. At least you didn't turn out to be your own father," I added, before thinking about that for a second. "Okay, technically—"

Niko shrugged. That whole thing about him having been Achilles once, whilst also being descended from Achilles? Technically not the weirdest thing that ever happened to him.

This here? _This _was probably the weirdest thing that ever happened to him.

"What about the text?" I asked suddenly. "The one telling us to go to Central Park in the first place?"

Robin frowned before pulling out his phone and examining it carefully. After a second, he glanced up at me, a little bit perplexed. "Apparently that was me," he said, showing me his phone, which clearly showed he'd sent the text alerting us to kid Niko's presence.

"How...how is that possible?" I asked. "No way this came from your phone! We would have seen your name!"

"Second SIM card," Robin said, before frowning thoughtfully. "Or maybe third. Possibly fourth." Ishiah was squinting at him pointedly, and he cleared his throat before adding, "But, obviously, had I sent the text originally I wouldn't have been surprised to see the two of you with a tiny version of Niko in tow."

"The timeline changed again," Niko said. He straightened, shifted in his seat, ran a finger along one of the scars on his wrist. "I don't know if anything else has changed," he said slowly. "But I do know I owe you all my life. Thank you for not giving up on me. Thank you for violating Time to save me."

"Without you, this world would probably not be here," Robin pointed out. "In any iteration. You're worth breaking Time for. Never forget that."

Niko didn't seem convinced, but he nodded all the same.

"And now I have actual proof that you really were a kid at some point," I added. "Gotta be some blackmail material I can use somehow in there."

Niko smiled softly. "Never forget, little brother," he said, calmly, "I changed your diapers."

I scowled at him. "Okay, you win. But if you think I'm breaking Time for you again, you've got another thing coming..."

**The End**


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